


The State of Being

by VulcansinSpace



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies), X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angel Erik, Falling In Love, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mind Reading, Pre-Slash, Student Charles, Telepathy, Wings of Desire au, a very loose interpretation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-21
Updated: 2017-08-21
Packaged: 2018-12-18 09:47:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11871756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VulcansinSpace/pseuds/VulcansinSpace
Summary: A loose Wings of Desire au where Erik is an angel who is no longer interested in observing humans, and has grown increasingly bored with his life as an angel. Everyday feels endlessly long, but also incredibly short. One day, he happens to come across a student who is able to sense his presence and Erik becomes fascinated with the human whose mind is like listening into a radio. Now he feels like maybe life might be worth living as he now as something that he can look forward to.Just a short story about how fate brought together Erik and Charles.





	The State of Being

**Author's Note:**

> I had just watched the film 'Wings of Desire' and after I came home from class this fic poured out of my fingers. It's been a couple months since then and I finally decided to post it after I read it over again and realized how much this concept sparked my imagination in the first place. 
> 
> While, i'm sure Wim Wenders would consider this entire fic an abomination, I also think this fic would make him less mad than say the film's american re-make with Nicolas Cage. 
> 
> This fic also does not ponder the philosophical nature of life, but is just a little exploration into the concept of the film. I wanted to also explore the way in which the film alludes to WWII and recreate that in this fic, however I'm not really a philosophical person so I decided to leave that be and allow you to keep that thought in the back of your mind instead. I feel like this fic could have been a longer more intimate exploration into Erik and Charles relationship, but for now this is all I am capable of giving.
> 
> I hope you enjoy this fic!

Erik has been watching over the city for what feels like a millennium. Yet it only feels like second at the same time. Students to finally pour in into the library, and Erik is perched on the ledge of the stairs. His gaze glances over the many faces entering and not one seems to interest him.

He’s not sure when it happened, when he stopped being interested in listening in on humans lives. Or was he ever really interested?He couldn’t say for certain. 

Erik thumbed through his notebook and he noticed his last entry was two human years ago, something about a student who recounted a vivid dream to their friends. 

_Had it really been that long since he cared?_ he wondered, and sighed as he tucked the notebook back into his trench coat pocket. 

Eternal life, and not a singular purpose. In a way, Erik envied humans. Of course, he wouldn’t ever let his fellow colleagues know this, but he just wasn’t interested in humanity as he was interested in being human. In feeling human. 

Erik touched the table feeling both the hard surface of the wood but at the same time nothing at all. He felt hopelessly empty and it was beginning to bother him. 

With a blink of his eye he was now wandering the main campus of Colombia and that’s when he felt it. 

Something. 

It was instantaneously there and gone again like a flash of lightening in the sky. Erik stopped where he was and looked around the courtyard. His eyes wandering over every human and his ears listening to every thought, searching for the person who touched his thoughts. 

Did Angels even have thoughts? 

The moment passed and Erik was only present with himself again feeling nothing at all. Erik wasn’t sure what caused the aberration, but the whole concept intrigued him more than anything he has seen in a very long time. 

Erik would have to investigate another day. 

*** 

Erik returned to the library and walked past his colleagues who nodded at him before returning to listening to their chosen human’s thoughts. 

Erik sat down next a student who appeared to be the only student who wasn’t studying. Erik leaned closer and listened to the numbing thoughts of the student who wished he could be anywhere but there in the library studying. 

Erik was drawn to students like these, ones who weren’t pondering life’s questions, but imaging a whole new reality beyond their wildest dreams. Erik loved human imagination, the ability to see beyond their physical world and not involve themselves with the harshness of reality. Those were the humans who drew him in the most, if you asked him, Erik couldn’t give you a reason why. 

*** 

It was one human week before Erik felt the lightening effect again. This time he could narrow it down to a group of students who had just entered the library. 

The feeling passed, but he knew one of the students had to have caused it. Erik wasn’t sure how a human could possibly connect with him the way that this individual could, but he wanted to investigate. 

Erik walked down the library stairs and towards the students who had congregated together at a table ready to begin a group project. He leaned close to each human, but could not hear anything from their minds that might explain the aberration. 

If Erik could feel disappointment, that’s what he would have felt. But Erik is an angel so he didn’t. He began to walk away when he had a sudden urge to look back. He couldn’t explain it, but he turned and look at one of the students who appeared to be looking right at him. Or possibly through him. If Erik had a physical form he would say that the gaze made his entire body shiver. 

Unfortunately, the student’s eyes fell and flickered back to his friends. Erik approached the young male student, he knelt close to his head and attempted to listen. The only sound Erik could hear was nothing but a faint whisper. However, it wasn’t a single voice in the dark but thousands of little voices speaking over top of each other. 

Erik didn’t know what to do. Or even how to feel, so to speak. 

So, he stood there at watched. He waited hours, maybe even minutes. Eventually the students packed their belongings and began to leave. Erik followed the group as they wandered through the courtyard, all their thoughts melting together in to a steady hum. 

Erik focused primarily on the one students mind, censoring all the rest. It was like he was listening to a radio rather than a mind, but one voice seemed to come clear through the thoughts every once in a while. However, he couldn’t decipher the words and he was determined to identify them. 

He passed by several angels, one of whom raised their brow at him for how determined he appeared to look. He paid them no mind because he finally had something truly human to discover, a mutation of sorts. 

Eventually the group broke apart and everyone waved goodbye to the student Charles, he learned, and finally it was just the two of them. Charles stood there silently on the street, and eventually looked up at the sky. 

“I can feel you,” He said “I’m not sure how, but I know you’re there.” 

Erik reached his arm out, touching Charles’ shoulder wondering if he would feel the fabric in his hand, or the warm human body. He didn’t. Nor did Charles. They stood there for a while and Charles sighed deeply. 

“Maybe, I’m going crazy” he murmured, and Erik shared the same sentiment. 

*** 

Charles Xavier was only 21 years old, he was 100% sure he had a stalker. Some sort of crazy mutant stalker who could become invisible and somehow could shield himself from Charles’ telepathy. It was incredibly bizarre because he could only feel this mind when he projected outwards to several minds across a vast area. Charles felt like some sort of bat trying to project out his sonar skills to find it the mind that weighed so heavily on him. 

The mind he felt was like no other mind he has ever felt before. It felt solid, like a metal rock and although he could sense it he couldn’t pierce the minds thoughts. 

Normally Charles isn’t one to pry, but nothing delighted him more than being able to solve a little mystery. Although, he wasn’t delighted by the idea of an invisible stalker. 

Charles dramatically rubbed his hands down his face, and kept his eyes closed for a moment enjoying the sensation of finally resting his eyes. He’d been in the library for hours and every so often he would project his mind out and the presence continued to sit across from him. 

Finally, Charles peeked at the chair across from him. There was nothing there. 

“I don’t know who you are,” Charles whispered narrowing his eyes “But, I’m going to single handily figure out what you are.” 

When he received no response –not like he was expecting one—he looks down at his genetics textbook and delves back into his readings. 

*** 

“Honey, I think you have a problem.” 

Erik glanced up and nodded at his colleague Frost, and replied “I’m not sure what you mean.” 

Emma smirked and walked around the table and draped her arm around the back of Charles. Her fingers trailing across his back until she fully enveloped Charles in her arms. 

“He’s kind of cute,” she remarked before she stood up straight and moved to sit at the edge of the table. 

“I mean this appears to be a problem, because you do know that your job is to listen in and guide. Not stare at the human for days. You need to move on to another person, otherwise you’ll appear to be obsessed. Which, of course, is never a good look for an angel.” 

Erik does not respond and watched as Emma closed her eyes while she leaned in to listen. After a moment, she opened her eyes and raised her eyebrow and nodded casually before she finally looked back at Erik. 

“I think I understand now.” Emma says and they sit together in silence till Emma eventually walks away to peer in on another student who seems to be having trouble understanding a topic. 

Erik leaned forward across the table and places his hand on the textbook Charles is reading. Charles doesn’t flinch, or move or notice anything. Erik sighed as he leaned back into the seat again, still frustrated he still can’t seem to make contact back. 

*** 

Erik eventually stopped following Charles everyday. 

One day when Charles was preparing for bed, he said good night to the room and that’s when Erik realised the whole situation was becoming a bit too bizarre for his liking. He realised that sitting in one of the trees on Charles very large property till dawn was a little odd. However, he wasn’t human so he didn’t need see the need to correct himself to human moral standards up until that point. 

When Charles was finally awake, Erik wandered his way back to the mansion and sat with Charles as he had breakfast with his little sister Raven. Erik once again tried to make contact by attempting to reach out his sister who unfortunately was too old to notice his presence. 

If Erik was a human, he would say that the following behaviour he performed was similar to a human tantrum. Erik repeatedly slammed his hands on the table screaming and shouting screamed even going so far as trying to pick up objects and throw them around the room. As usual, nothing worked. No papers were rustled by the vibrations of his hands, nor was he able to handle any objects let alone shatter them into pieces. 

Erik had found water in the desert, and he was thirsting for it so desperately but it started to feel like it was all a mirage. He stood there in the kitchen, Charles and Raven chatting casually like Erik wasn’t there, and that’s when he decided it was time. 

Erik was gone. 

*** 

Charles had just spooned another mouthful of cereal into his mouth when he noticed the presence disappeared. 

“What’s wrong?” Raven asked, but Charles didn’t respond. He only looked at his cereal bowl again and tried to shrug away the feeling of loss. 

*** 

Erik sat on the library desk next to Emma as they both silently watched over the students. 

Emma pulled out her notebook and jotted down a note before turning to Erik and said, “today a student smuggled a book out of the library.” 

Erik hummed in response, before replying “today an individual was standing in the rain in the courtyard, just looking up at the sky.” 

“Why?” questioned Emma. 

“I’m not sure.” 

“Humans are strange” 

“Indeed” 

The conversation went silent for a while before Emma chirped in again. 

“What happened to the boy with a thousand thoughts?” 

“Is that what he decided to name him? 

Emma didn’t respond, and Erik’s eyes roamed over the many faces staring intensely at their laptops and textbooks before he decided to speak. 

“I’m not sure. I attempted to make contact, but I wasn’t able too.” 

Emma nodded in response, and the both looked out on the large room again. 

“Why don’t you try again?” She asked. 

This took Erik by surprise, “try again?” 

She looked at him and nodded, “try again.” 

*** 

Erik wandered the campus until he came across Charles again. This time Charles was sitting in a lab and jotting notes into his notebook as he peering into his microscope once again. 

When Erik sat across from Charles again that’s when Charles looked up and his eyes pierced straight through him. 

“It’s you,” Charles whispered, and Erik noticed that Charles was wearing a lanyard with a card indicating he was now a professor at Columbia opposed to the young undergraduate student he once was. Erik then realised the passage of time for Charles was years instead of days. 

Erik could tell that Charles hair was a bit longer, and his face looked a bit more strong and slimmer and less round and soft like it once was. Charles was now wearing glasses on the regular instead of wearing contact lenses, like he once observed Charles remove after a long study session in the library. 

Erik reached out and touched Charles hand, but neither of them felt it. Charles’ eyes darted around sporadically searching for an object or a face to look at but all he could see was empty air. For once Erik felt guilty that he allowed time to slip past him and allow Charles to age. 

Erik closed his eyes and willed Charles to notice his presence and when he opened his eyes Charles’ eye’s looked wet. It was the first time he wondered what colour looked like. 

“I felt you,” Charles said “well, your mind at least. I know you are there my friend. It’s been so long.” 

They sat there pleasantly in silence, a silent hum of energy filled the room. An energy of what Erik assumed joy felt like. 

That’s when Erik decided it was time. 

*** 

When Erik opened his eyes for the first time his corporal body, he first noticed what the feeling of weight felt like. From there he noticed the breeze in the air, the feeling of dew on the grass, and the sun in his eyes. 

Every colour seemed so bright and vivid, the world no longer felt uncanny but felt more real than ever did before. 

This was the state of being. 

Erik sat up and from the sky fell his metal armour, which Erik failed to miss and the armour fell right on his stomach. 

Erik groaned in pain, and that’s when he noticed the delightful feeling of pain. His first thought in this physical form was to find Charles. He realised in that moment that he was longing to be human, and humanity meant understanding the feeling in his stomach (other than pain) that compelled him to truly feel what life was like. 

The first thing he noticed he didn’t like about being human, was the annoyance of walking. After some time, he eventually found his way to a pawn shop and passed off his old angelic uniform as roman armour to be able to buy himself some new clothes. 

Determined, he walked to the library and sat in his usual spot where he would sit with Charles. Then he felt the feeling again, the presence of a mind washing over his own and floating away. It was no longer a sharp sensation, but one that made him feel like what humans describe as an angelic experience. 

Charles sat across from Erik in their usual spot with a small smile on his face. Erik wondered if this was the first time he was truly able to see Charles. He has been able to look and observe him, but never actually feel the presence and emotion that Charles can make him feel. It’s different. It’s better. 

“After I finally felt you again I came to this spot everyday, even for just a little bit, hoping that I’d find you here. I never thought I’d finally meet my mutant stalker.” 

“I’m not a mutant, but an angel.” 

“An angel, huh? Well what matters is now I can now see you, at least I know that you’re real now and not something I imagined.” 

“I could say the same,” Erik responded “I wondered if you were apart of my imagination as well.” 

Charles laughed and tilted his head slightly, his eyes twinkled as they explored Erik’s human facial features. 

“So… do all Angels wear turtlenecks?” 

For the first time Erik laughed, and he think’s it might be his favourite feeling.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading


End file.
